oh i dont doubt you, this is obviously your field. im soaking ot all up.
i'll def bounce it off you next time i see one i like.... speaking of

what about the XD9? my buddy has the XD40 i think, it felt good in my paws, i bit big, but i hear the reviews are great? whats your take?

Believe it or not, never handled an XD. I haven't heard anything bad about them. The sights aren't always perfectly zeroed, but then the only gun I've ever seen with fixed sights that were properly zeroed is my HK (this includes Sigs). It's easy enough to zero it though, a gunsmith can do it for not much money (you can do it too, I'm just too afraid of marring the finish to do it myself).